instrumental music – Page 5

Revelatory covers (#20 in series): “I’ll Be Seeing You”, sans words, but really singing…

Published July 5, 2021 by Pelidoug

Revelatory covers (#20 in series): “I’ll Be Seeing You”, sans words, but really singing…

Arguably the quintessential nostalgic song, I’ll Be Seeing You was composed in 1938. (music by Sammy Fain, words by Irving Kahal)

That year it was inserted into a Broadway musical…which flopped.

The song, however, became a “standard”, covered by countless singers…and not a few instrumentalists.

It was a #1 hit for Bing Crosby in 1944.

Frank Sinatra recorded it more than once.

Even Eric Clapton did so, in 2016.

The most celebrated recording – Billie Holiday’s 1944 version – is the one which reached Mars in 2018, as the conclusion to NASA’s final transmission to its Explorer rover.

However, the most “out of this world” version to reach this Earthling’s ears is a “live” and exploratory instrumental trio treatment, delivered in “the city of fallen angels”, in June 2016.

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Revelatory covers (#19 in series): Hungarian wedding song, in nicely-unlikely “marriage”

Published June 24, 2021 by Pelidoug

…which sees a US-resident, Cameroonian bassist/vocalist engage with a Hungarian guitar virtuoso.

This is a beautiful, 2020-vintage improvisatory version of a traditional song which Béla Bartók collected more than a century ago…

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Autumn leaves…but not as you usually know them

Published May 22, 2021 by Pelidoug

Autumn leaves…but not as you usually know them

Not all deciduous trees have home addresses in cool temperate parts of the Northern Hemisphere.

This one’s home is in a very particular part of tropical Australia.

This individual is circa 750 years old, weighs 36 tonnes, and is thriving in a place with quite the “wrong” climate, 3200 kilometres from home.

Even more amazingly, to get “here” it survived uprooting, followed by almost certainly the longest road trip ever undertaken by a large, living tree.

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Life Goes On/ Happy 85th birthday, Carla Bley

Published May 12, 2021 by Pelidoug

Life Goes On/ Happy 85th birthday, Carla Bley

In the USA, it is currently “yesterday”, Tuesday, 11 May, 2021.

I hope that Carla Bley is enjoying a very happy birthday with her beloved, Steve Swallow.

For rather more than my entire adult life, Carla Bley has composed, arranged and played singular music, variously – sometimes, simultaneously – provocative, surprising, very amusing, satirical, sublimely lyrical, complex, seemingly-simple…

Her three most recent releases – all, new trio recordings of new music, made between 2013 and 2019 – are some of her finest, ever.

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Ugly beauty: “Forest Motors” (# 89 in “a shining moment” series)

Published March 31, 2021 by Pelidoug

Ugly beauty: “Forest Motors” (# 89 in “a shining moment” series)

A big, rusting surprise was just one minute’s walk away from the house in which we recently spent sixteen nights – on a forested hill near Youngs Siding, in Western Australia’s Deep South.

This post’s musical complement: a singular treatment of an apropos Thelonious Monk number, plus the most tender song ever written about a car salesman….

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Vale Frank Kimbrough (1956-2020)

Published January 9, 2021 by Pelidoug

Vale Frank Kimbrough (1956-2020)

Many self-declared “jazz lovers” would not recognise his name, nor have ever heard him…wittingly, at least.

That said, I am far from alone – and am in some very good company – in having long regarded Frank Kimbrough as one of the select few improvising pianists who ought be described/remembered as “one of the greats”.

if I were only ever allowed another listen to just ten “piano trio tracks”, his sublimely beautiful Waiting in Santander would be one of them:

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Surface, shifting (#88 in “a shining moment” series)

Published December 16, 2020 by Pelidoug

Surface, shifting (#88 in “a shining moment” series)

“Our” planet’s water surfaces are all shifting, always.

This reality is not always readily apparent.

It is, however, strikingly evident when one looks across a substantial intertidal zone when the tide is “out”.

This post’s musical component is Surface Level III – a particularly beautiful piece from Appearance, Chris Abrahams’ 2020 solo piano album.

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“Golden Hour” at Lake Monger

Published November 23, 2020 by Pelidoug

“Golden Hour” at Lake Monger

(this post includes photographic advice and a musical bonus)

Officially, Perth’s November 21 2020 sunset occurred at 6.59 pm.

Effectively, on the west side of Lake Monger, the sun had set some minutes earlier, thanks to the (modest) hill/stabilised dune which rises behind the lake’s western side.

Where I took the featured image, the golden hour’s most magical moment was at 6.43 pm.

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Not a “miserable” place (#87 in “a shining moment” series)

Published November 12, 2020 by Pelidoug

Not a “miserable” place (#87 in “a shining moment” series)

Residents of the Australian Perth – a prodigiously sunny city – tend to be very sooky about rain, clouds and cool weather.

Many of them believe that Western Australia’s southernmost coastal region is a “bleak” place, one that only mad persons would voluntarily visit at any time other than summer.

In fact, globally speaking, WA’s Deep South enjoys a warm temperate climate, and even in winter it would not be at all odd to see Mandalay Beach looking as it does in this post.

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“In a mist” (#85 in “a shining moment” series)

Published October 18, 2020 by Pelidoug

“In a mist” (#85 in “a shining moment” series)

This is a sequel to the immediately preceding post.

It involves the same vantage point, on the same morning, but this post’s image (copyright Doug Spencer) was taken 13 minutes later, at 7.03 am, with a longer lens. (400mm, effectively)

Again, its musical complement is the work of a troubled genius who died young.

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Category: instrumental music